Here it is! 2020. Not just another year but another decade. I always find New Year to be a little anticlimactic for me. Most people are off making resolutions, restarting counters or even restarting themselves, but I have always considered a new year to be academic years. I have spent most of my memorable life in school/academia with the exception of about 9 months – and then I desperately found a way back. Now, as a teacher, I definitely think of August/September as the New Year and I don’t think that is ever going to change.
I also don’t tend to wait until a big milestone to make small changes in my life. I just go ahead an make them. That said… lots of things this year have converged to mean that January is actually a great time for new starts!
I have a lot of new projects coming up, both professionally and personally, and there are a few changes at home too – all exciting – so I am eager to think of this as a ‘New Year, continuing to be fantastic Me’. Due to this, I have decided to officially share what are going to be my reading related resolutions for 2020!
#1 – Develop my Blog and YouTube Channel
My blog died last year, and I started a YouTube channel with the best of intentions but found it difficult to keep up. That is not going to be the way going forward! I will be restarting my blog and making sure that I’m sticking to a solid blog schedule. I will also be revitalising my YouTube channel, ensuring I’m sticking to trying to make content that makes me smile.
#2 – Reduce my physical TBR by 50 books
Last year I read so many books, but I still haven’t actually reduced my physical TBR! It isn’t that I don’t want to own as many books, it is simply that I just want to actually read them. They are all books that I desperately wanted to read at some point, or was really interested in and so I need to make it a priority to read them. As of writing this, my TBR sits at 287 books (physical…Kindle doesn’t count!) but I know that this is going to go up to around 300 over the year. By setting my Goodreads goal to read 75 books, this should make sure I get below 250, even when I buy a few!
#3 – Try new genres and authors
I always aim to expand my reading and do everything I can to soak up all the most interesting stories in the world. Last year was about trying to finish some series’ (I wasn’t really that successful) but this year will be about starting new stories. I want to expand some of my reads in to new genres and for genres I am already familiar with, I really want to read some new authors. With this in mind…this is finally going to be the year that I read Brandon Sanderson!
#4 – Reignite my research
I want to an event towards the end of the year which massively igniting my interest in some of my original research and in continuing to look in to this. After then listening to my students and others around me, I realised that there may actually be a place for some of that research. I am now really eager and excited to make sure that I carve out reading and research time to getting back to academic study and writing some papers over this year. My focus – as always – is on young adult literature and as I make developments over the year, I will definitely keep updating.
#5 – Rekindle my writing
My final reading related resolution is to rekindle my writing. I have spent a couple of years really carving out reading time and getting back to enjoying that part of my life, but throughout those years my personally writing has massively fallen to the wayside. I am now eager to ensure that I am getting that back. I have always felt that reading can massively help with my writing and so this will be a big part of my writing, but I will also be updating more on my personal writing journey and how it feels to try to get back in to a hobby that once was a habit I had every day!
So that is all, 5 resolutions are definitely enough to be getting on with – especially since they are massive resolutions to attempt to approach. I am happy and eager to be making some headway towards this and have already started making an attempt at my reading. Admittedly…I am rereading, and already thinking of heading to the bookstore on Friday…SO this is going to fail immediately – but it would not be a resolution unless you immediately fail it, right?
WISH ME LUCK and Happy Reading! 
Afternoon Literature 